Well, I've been home for three days now and it's been okay. Going away has helped me appreciate home (although I do prefer to be away), every time I come back I make connections to how I am when I'm away from home and how my home has influenced that. I've made peace with a lot of the problems of my past, I can honestly look at me and my father's differences and not feel frustrated. I realize that holding onto that bitterness does nothing but burden me, blind me. I used to hold onto all that anger because I thought I was gaurding myself. This isn't to say my feelings of anger weren't justified, after all, he and I still don't see eye to eye on some things. But as time passes and I come to understand him and myself more and I even try to humble myself and to learn something from his perspective. I believe you can learn something from anyone, you just have to take what people say with that grain of salt. Some you take with more salt than others but you get the point. Instead of looking at how my father and I can't get along, I look at how we do bond and the similarities we share (note: for those of you who don't know, I used to NEVER admit that my father and I had anything whatsoever in common). I know I get my love of physical labor from my father, I can see the solace he gets in working with his hands and the gratification after he makes something new. From him I learned to take pride in what I can do without boasting it. A quiet confidence is something that my mother and father both taught me in their own ways. Confidence, to me, is asserting yourself through your actions, not just saying "I'm good at this," when you do something well it will show, and if no one else sees it then you have to. When I think of my mother, I think of spirituality and that I would have none if it weren't for her. My faith has gotten me through the worst of times, not just faith in God, but faith in what God has provided me with - people. All that being said, I smell bad and I have to shower.

"Many people seem simply not to understand love, [they] burden its beateous simplicity with preconceived notions and unrealistic expectations." - RA Salvatore